The MHC Blog

Powerful Business Insights for Succesful Leaders

Employing Across Generations

At MHC Consulting, we work with Companies of all sizes and industries. In our experience, regardless of Company size, when we first speak to clients to ascertain their business pain points, the main issue we hear is "people" – finding, attracting, hiring, retaining and dealing with poor performers. The frustrations currently seem to be pointing at "just how do you manage millenials in the workplace?", a question we are frequently being asked and a challange that Generation X is struggling with.

The generational gap is starting to become a real issue for some of our UAE based clients and I am sure the challenges we are hearing are the same regardless of location.

Check out what Simon Sinek has to say on the issues that we have created HERE

Millennials have different ideas and views that do not always resonate with how the Company is currently led, Companies need to tap into these new ideas in order to keep their workforce engaged and also to keep their business innovating and progressing. However, Millennials have different expectations on the workplace, they expect a more flexible approach to their working day, working from home or having flexible office timings. They are also less loyal to a Company and tend to move on quickly.

Baby Boomers and Gen X tend to form the recruiting Senior Team. They prefer a structured approach to the working day and processes, believe that its only through hard work (read "long hours"!) that the work gets done and welcome loyalty and longevity. New ideas are foreign to their thinking, they could potentially miss a great future employee as they are talking a different language at the interview and in the contract negotiation.

We are currently working with a successful family business that is keen to hand over the reins to their children and a technology based Company where they have a dedicated workforce that have been with them for 15+ years. The issues they face are different but are both born from the generation gap ways of thinking.

With the family based Company, the current leaders are generation baby boomer. Dedicated, hardworking team players but are less adaptive to new ways of working. Their identified internal succession are family members and generation millennial who bring with them their tech savvy and an entrepreneurial approach but want and expect a flexible work life balance. The leaders are struggling to take on board new ideas and are pushing back, making the transition difficult, potentially losing their identified succession. They are in danger of this long running family business being sold off as their family members lose interest in such a traditional way of working and do not have the patience to push much needed change through.

With the technology based Company, they recognise they need to innovate continuously, however their current C Suit management team fall into Gen X. The Company is very clear that to grow at their planned rate they need to bring on board millennials which will mean they need to review their office ways of working to bring in a more flexible approach.

And it’s not just the longer running businesses that are suffering in this talent war. Entrepreneurial startup Companies are also struggling. Young entrepreneurs usually fall into generation millennial, but the start up is their idea and venture. Drawing on their entrepreneurial spirt they work long hours, constantly innovating their idea to make their Company successful. They are employing from the same millennial talent pool, they need the pros that this generation bring to the Company, but need to source total “rock stars”, willing and able to multitask and give their all to the Company. It’s a challenge that relies on having a solid recruitment process in place.

If you are keen to tap into some key hints and tips on how to work with millenials, please download our fact sheet today.

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A Business Growth and HR Strategist helping medium size companies to Scale Up using proven systems.
Claire is an MCIPD qualified Human Resource professional, with 25+ years’ experience working within various industries and 10 + years’ experience of HR practices throughout the Middle East. As a HR Generalist she has held a number of senior and Board level HR positions. She is experienced in working at both strategic and tactical levels.